When Bad News Is Good For ESPN2's FNF (Sort Of)

By Jake Donovan

Rare is the case that an ESPN2 Friday Night Fights card will dominate the headlines. It doesn’t hurt that it’s the only game in town this week, at least if your boxing intake is limited to what’s available on stateside television.

What should hurt this week’s edition is the sea of bad news – and press – it has received in recent days. Instead, it’s what has boxing fans talking the past couple of days.

Negative publicity is still publicity.

Somehow the show will still go on, which for the moment is still scheduled to take place at the Mahi Shrine in Miami, FL (Friday, ESPN2, 8:30PM ET). Hitting the scrap heap would be all of the promotional material that was printed up when the show was first announced, as changes have since been made not just to the main event and co-feature, but also the venue, city and state in which they were supposed to fight.

Once upon a time, former welterweight titlist Carlos Quintana was to face veteran spoiler Danny Perez in a junior middleweight bout that would top a card in Chicago, IL. The suggested co-feature was a tasty welterweight crossroads battle between noted prospects Joey Hernandez and Damian Frias.

On paper, it easily ranks up there with the best that ESPN2 had to offer thus far in 2009. All too often, quality cards at anything less than a premium seem – and often are – too good to be true.

This weekend is obviously no exception.

The first change came in location. The Windy City was suggested, but the show would relocate to the sunny streets of Miami. No major bust for promoter Richie Boy Entertainment. While based out of Chicago, they’ve also staged shows in Florida, including the last time Joey Hernandez stepped foot in a boxing ring, three months ago.

For the moment, Hernandez is still slated to enter the ring this weekend. Who it will be against isn’t immediately clear. Frias wound up pulling out of the fight over a contract dispute.

His team accepted that fight under the belief that it would be fought at welterweight. A verbal agreement was reached, at least according to manager Si Stern. Frias, a once-beaten Cuban southpaw now based out of Miami, had never fought heavier than 146 ¾ for any fight, a weight that just happened to come the last time he stepped foot in the ring after having spent the majority of his career hovering around junior welterweight.

What was said and what was typed in the contract turned out to be two different matters and in the end a deal breaker.

The contract Stern received referenced a junior middleweight (154 lb.) regional title fight, or seven pounds more than he believed would be the weight for the welterweight version of the same belt. Hernandez bounces back and forth between the weights, but any fight that resembles anything remotely noteworthy have all taken place at welterweight.

It would make sense for those handling the career of the de facto house fighter to try to gain any edge they can. This time, it left Frias without a dance partner, at least for the time being.

Danny Perez now has someone to tangle with, though the selection process has caused more than a ripple.

For the second time this year, former welterweight titlist Carlos Quintana was forced to withdraw from a fight, on both occasions slated to headline ESPN2 Friday Night Fights.

It hasn’t exactly been the best of times for the Puerto Rican southpaw. His last great moment came more than a year ago, when he not only pulled off a major upset over previously unbeaten Paul Williams, but beat him with room to spare in their February 2008 HBO bout.

His 15 minutes of fame barely lasted just that; Quintana conceded his alphabet title to Williams just four months later, getting dusted in the opening round of their Showtime-televised rematch.

Since then, it’s been a knockout win over an upside down journeyman and a series of out-of-the-ring disappointments that have kept him benched for all of 2009 thus far.

His year was supposed to begin with a January clash with Eromosele Albert, but fell through after suffering an injury. Faded journeyman Germaine Sanders wound up taking his place, leaving ESPN2 with an extremely dull and uncompetitive main event.

Fast forward to late May, when news came down of Quintana once again leaving an opponent stuck at the altar. Flu-like symptoms knocked out the 32-year old, who was told by his physician that he was unfit to fight by the June 5th televised date.

ESPN2 producers were forced to scramble for a replacement, to which several fighters volunteered their services. One was Ishe Smith, the former Contender contestant and current fringe junior middleweight contender. Smith just so happened to recently sign with DiBella Entertainment, who also promotes Quintana.

The ESPN2 brass suspected that the volatile promoter was attempting to pull a bait-and-switch in order to sneak Smith on the show, prompting them to question the validity of Quintana’s sickness and also the fact that medical notes for his past two pullouts have come from the same physician.

Perhaps out of spite, or simply the fact that he’s not always the most entertaining fighter in the world, Smith’s name never warranted consideration among the ESPN2 staff. Instead brought in was welterweight spoiler Carlos Molina.

The pick was slammed by Team Ishe (to be expected), and DiBella had nary a kind word for ESPN’s Doug Loughrey, going so far as to suggest that Smith is being deliberately blackballed – emphasis on Black, as the belief regarding boxing decisions made in Bristol is their existing a strong preference toward Latino fighter, believing their network would result in more exciting fights being showcased on a consistent basis.

For what it’s worth, it’s the second time in 2009 that Smith was rejected as a late replacement by ESPN2 – or the same number of times this year they’ve attempted to grant Quintana a main event slot. The last time Smith was ready to pinch hit was eight weeks ago, when middleweight contender David Lopez required an opponent. Smith’s hand was raised but the network instead went with Ossie Duran, who was 0-1-1 heading into the fight, and barely .500 in his past six bouts to that point.

When a name with sabor was suggested for this weekend’s fight, Smith went bonkers, even half-heartedly informing boxing website Boxingtalk.com that he was considering a name change to something more ethnically favorable. His response made it clear that he firmly believes himself far more qualified than any of the names ESPN2 instead considered.

Overlooked is the fact that Molina is actually on a nice little streak, having won eight straight against respectable competition since overcoming a rough patch in his career in which he lost three straight to the likes of Mike Alvarado and Julio Cesar Chavez Jr.

Smith’s upset of Pawel Wolak last summer on Shobox offered a much needed resuscitation to a career that was rapidly racing toward obscurity. He entered the fight having lost two of his past three, including an absolute stinker against Sechew Powell more than a year prior on HBO. A points loss to Joel Julio – on ESPN2, no less – was a much tighter and more entertaining affair, with many believing Smith deserved the nod.

Apparently, the impression he left on the Deuce was that he no longer deserved airtime on their network.

It’s reasonable to suggest that Smith is an unintentional casualty in all of this. What’s clear is that ESPN2 isn’t thrilled with having to explain why two attempts to get into bed with Carlos Quintana resulted in last-minute shakeups not featuring the Puerto Rican.

That any talk at all is still coming of a card headlined by Danny Perez and Carlos Molina is truly remarkable. When the sport is humming with notable fights every weekend, ESPN2’s Friday Night Fights rarely rates as anything better than a tablesetter, and almost never the topic of discussion, at least not going in.

But with a weekend all to itself and seemingly daily changes being made to their show, all eyes will be on ESPN2 Friday Night Fights. Most likely, they will be in search of answers. For now, the more questions that are raised, the better the chance that people will remember there are actually fights on this weekend.

Negative publicity or not, that can’t be a bad thing for ESPN2 Friday Night Fights.

Jake Donovan is the managing editor of Boxingscene.com and an award-winning member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. Contact Jake at JakeNDaBox@gmail.com .